Rural School Leaflet No. 21. 


October. 1923. 


DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR 
US. BUREAU OF EDUCATION 
WASHINGTON, D. C. 


TAXPAYING AS A LESSON IN CITIZENSHIP. 

By Macy Campbell, 

Head of the Department of Rural Education, Iowa State Teachers’ College. 


During the past few years there has been aroused among the 
people of the several States an increasing demand for the teaching 
of citizenship in the public schools. The people have emphatically 
reaffirmed through legislation their belief that in the American 
democracy it is a cardinal duty of the public schools to teach good 
citizenship. 

When the duties of the good citizen are carefully passed in re¬ 
view, it is found that there is none more important than his duty 
to pay his taxes willingly and intelligently. 

By intelligently we mean that the good citizen will keep himself 
informed on the relation of the tax systenuto the changing economic 
life of his period and seek to secure such readjustments as are necessary 
from time to time to make taxation fall on each citizen as nearly as* 
possible in proportion to his ability to pay. We mean further that the 
good citizen will inform himself as to whether the funds raised by 
taxation are being expended wisely and economically. These matters 
lie beyond the scope of this leaflet and will not be treated here. 

We will deal here with the question of preparing the citizen to 
pay his taxes willingly. 

It is hard to teach an old dog new tricks, says an old proverb 
which has come down to us out of the accumulated wisdom of the 
race, leaving us to infer that there is hope of effective results if we 
begin with the puppies. Theodore Roosevelt said, “If you would 
do something for the average man, you must begin before he is a 
man; the hope of success lies in working with the boy, and not with 
the man.” How often a strong man in the midst of great temptation 
and stress clings for support to the simple truths which he learned 
as a boy at his mother’s knee! The willing payment of taxes, being 
one of the fundamental duties of citizenship in a democracy, should 

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13 

2 TAXPAYING AS A LESSON IN CITIZENSHIP. “ U (f \ 

be rooted in the mind and heart of the little citizen before he has 
become a big citizen. 

What a spectacle! Tens of thousands of little citizens, under the 
guidance of their teachers, saluting the American flag proudly in 
school, and presently, when out of school and grown to man’s estate, 
forgetting to support that flag and the country for which it stands 
by the performance of the citizen’s most important duty, that of 
paying his taxes intelligently and willingly. The conviction that it 
is the sacred duty of the good citizen to pay his taxes willingly 
should be rooted in the generous, open heart of childhood, before the * 
acquiring of property has aroused those selfish instincts which cause 
so many citizens to join the ranks of tax evaders on the poor excuse 
that “ everybody is doing it.” • 

The little citizen who has not been prepared to keep his heart 
right toward his country becomes an easy victim, as a big citizen, to 
the common weaknesses of selfishness. The problem for the Ameri¬ 
can school to solve is how may the teacher root the generous con¬ 
victions which have to do with the willing payment of taxes firmly 
in the minds and hearts of little citizens. This is to be done by the 
simple, earnest, and concrete presentation of what we actually buy 
with the money we pay as taxes . This simple fact can be made so 
clear and convincing through concrete illustrations that it makes 
a lifelong impression on every child in school. 

How many boys and girls to-day know that the choicest things 
in civilization are bought and paid for with taxes? 

Little citizens growing up in America with the “ blessings of 
liberty ” all about them sometimes assume that these are gifts of 
nature, like the fresh air and sunlight and refreshing showers. No, 
the “ blessings of liberty ” must all be bought and paid for. We 
buy them and we pay for them with taxes . 

Let us examine the clear and simple catalogue of the choicest 
things in American civilization which is given us in the preamble 
to the Constitution of the United States. 

“ We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more 
perfect union ”-- 

That more perfect union which gives us national unity and 
strength was bought and paid for in part with taxes. 

“ Establish justice ”_ 

The courts and the machinery for establishing justice must be 
bought and paid for with taxes. 

“ Insure domestic tranquillity ”_ 

The peace officers and State militia must be bought and paid for 
with taxes. 

“ Provide for the common defense ”__ 


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TAXPAYING AS A LESSON IN CITIZENSHIP. 3 

The Army and Navy must be provided and paid for with taxes. 

“ Promote the general welfare ”_ 

The education of the young, the development of roads, the protec¬ 
tion of the public health, and the many other activities of govern¬ 
ment which are grouped under the head of promoting the general 
welfare must be bought and paid for with taxes. 

“ Secure the blessings of liberty ”_ 

Let us stop here and make a closer study of the blessings of liberty 
as they affect our own lives. 

Let us make a list of the blessings of liberty which are bought and 
paid for with taxes. 


1. THE PROTECTION OF MY LIFE. 

My life is one of my dearest possessions. The most powerful in¬ 
stinct in human nature is the instinct toward self-preservation. In 
America protection to life is bought and paid for with taxes. 

If we should decide to stop paying taxes, I would have to become 
entirely responsible for the protection of my own life. Think in what 
constant danger and anxiety I would find myself. Think of the con¬ 
stant danger and anxiety that would harass us all. Little children 
would not dare to venture out beyond the protection of their parents; 
women would have to go armed and would not dare to venture far 
from the protection of their homes; the men themselves would be in 
constant fear of being shot from behind by some one who wished to 
rob them of their property or despoil them of their families. No 
family would dare lie down to sleep without locking themselves in 
a stronghold or posting armed guards to watch over them as they 
slept. Think how much better it is to have my Government watch 
over and protect my life constantly and effectively. 

Another great loss would grow out of the loss of protection to my 
life. I would be at great inconvenience in trying to protect my 
life while at work and could not do my work well. The inconvenience 
of having to provide protection for the life of each member of the 
family would greatly retard the family in accomplishing its work. 
It would be very expensive to provide armed guards and build 
strongholds and to be constantly interrupted while at work—very 
much more expensive to try to provide protection to life individually 
than it is to buy this protection wholesale, through cooperation with 
a large number of others. Every time we pay out taxes we buy 
wholesale the very best of protection for our lives. 

Let us examine at this point an economic principle which every 
young citizen should come to understand. On lower Broadway in 
New York City stands a famous building, one of the tallest in the 
world. Its top seems almost to reach the clouds. The most wonder- 




4 


TAXPAYING AS A LESSON IN CITIZENSHIP, 


ful thing about this great skyscraper is that it is built out of 10- 
cent pieces. Yes, the profits of 10-cent sales paid for this great 
building. Its owner knew the old proverb which every merchant 
knows, that “ well bought is half sold.” He knew that if he should 
buy in large enough quantities, he could buy at such a low figure that 
he could sell the articles for 10 cents each and make a profit. The 
Woolworth Building is a forcible reminder of the economic prin¬ 
ciple that to buy in large quantities enables one to buy at a low price . 

People by cooperating together in large numbers and buying pro¬ 
tection for their lives wholesale are able to buy this protection much 
more cheaply than if they bought it individually, each person for 
himself. By levying a tax upon themselves the people pay for the 
protection to life which they have bought wholesale for the lives of 
all of the people. In this way they are able to secure a great bargain 
in the price which they pay for that most important and necessary 
thing—protection to life. 

We are all attracted by bargains offered by the stores on goods 
which are of immediate personal interest to us. The writer once 
visited a large department store in Chicago on a Monday morning 
after this store had advertised a bargain sale in large headlines in 
the Sunday newspapers. It seemed that every woman in Chicago 
must be standing in the long lines which pressed upon the doors, im¬ 
patient for the hour of opening to arrive. When the doors were 
opened there was a mad scramble, everyone striving to be first to 
reach the counters and select the best bargain for herself. The best 
bargains offered by enterprising merchants are not to be compared 
to the bargains which the people secure for themselves when they 
purchase the choicest and most necessary things in civilization whole¬ 
sale and pay for them with taxes. As citizens seldom realize what 
bargains their taxes really buy for them, few are found crowding 
one another in order to reach the paying wicket first on the opening 
morning when the taxes are payable for the new year. 

One reason that we do not realize the great bargain that we have 
secured when we buy the choicest things in civilization wholesale and 
pay for them with taxes is that we do not see clearly that which we 
have purchased; neither do we realize definitely that it has actually 
been delivered to us. This is precisely what we want our youth to 
see when they are forming the concept of citizenship. When a pur¬ 
chaser attends a bargain sale at a shoe store, he sees and examines 
carefully in his own hands the shoes which in quality and style and 
fit are just what he wants. He finds them a real bargain at the 
marked-down price at which they are offered, pays his money 
willingly, and carries the shoes home with great satisfaction. He 
displays the shoes to his friends and tells them with enthusiasm of the 
splendid purchase he has made. How different when the citizen 


TAXPAYING AS A LESSON IN CITIZENSHIP. 


5 


goes to pay his taxes. Now he does not visualize the great array of 
■choice things which he is actually purchasing for himself and family. 
He does not realize that organized society is constantly delivering 
these to him. He sees instead the statement that taxes are due, pays 
his money, often grudgingly, and carries home a little slip of paper as 
a tax receipt, thinking that the scrap of paper is all that he has pur¬ 
chased with his hard-earned money and that it is all that has been 
delivered to him. He does not tell his friends with enthusiasm of 
the splendid bargain he has made that day. No, he goes home de¬ 
pressed and complains to his wife about the high taxes he has had to 
pay. 

2. PROTECTION TO MY PROPERTY. 

Next after the protection of our lives most of us would put the 
protection of our property as our most pressing interest. Again, 
this service can be provided much more economically by organized 
society as a whole than it can be provided by the individual. By 
purchasing protection to property wholesale it can be bought at 
a greatly reduced cost. Consider the situation of the farmer with 
growing crops in open fields, livestock in distant pastures, hogs in 
his pens, poultry in the henhouse, horses, grain, and machinery in 
the barns. If no taxes were paid to purchase wholesale the protec¬ 
tion of organized society for his property, the farmer would be at 
great difficulty and great expense to provide protection for it him¬ 
self. Working under the conditions of protection by society, one 
hired man usually supplies all the extra help needed on a 160-acre 
farm. His time is given to plowing, planting, and harvesting, and to 
caring for the livestock. These activities are economically productive. 
If protection to his property were not purchased wholesale from 
organized society through the payment of taxes, the farmer would 
have to employ not one hired man but many. It would take four 
or more to watch one 40-acre field of corn effectively through the 
night. It would take many others to watch over the livestock 
scattered in pastures and gathered about the barns. These men 
would give no economically productive service. The cost of their 
services would make protection, as provided by the individual farmer 
for his own property, very expensive indeed. The deterrent effect 
which the power of organized society as a whole has on marauders 
makes protection to property secured in this manner very much 
more effective than that which would result if each one were left 
to depend entirely upon himself for the protection of his own prop¬ 
erty. In other words, when we pay our taxes we not only buy pro¬ 
tection for our property at a very low price, at a great bargain 
indeed, but we buy the very best quality of protection that can 
be had. 


6 


TAXPAYING AS A LESSON IN CITIZENSHIP. 


3. ROADS FOR MY USE. 

By purchasing country highways and city streets wholesale, on a 
vast cooperative plan through taxation, it is possible for each indi¬ 
vidual to secure these avenues of travel for his own use at a cost 
which is but a very small fraction of what the cost would be to each 
individual if he had to provide his own individual road or street. 
The farmer who pays his taxes has the use of two and one-half mil¬ 
lion miles of country roads leading from his farm home to the mar¬ 
ket, to the post office, to the school, to the doctor’s office, to the church, 
to the homes of distant relatives and friends, to every town and city 
in the United States, to all the natural beauty spots and to every one 
of the 7,000,000 farm homes in America. The economy of buying 
roads wholesale and paying for them with taxes is so obvious that 
none can fail to appreciate the great bargain in roads which we 
secure when we pay our taxes. 

4. SCHOOLS FOR THE YOUNG. 

It is a fundamental necessity of the modern State to educate its 
citizens for its own self-preservation. 

It is a fundamental duty of a democratic State to open the doors 
of the schoolhouse on equal terms to all the children of the State. 

The most economical and effective way to accomplish these is 
through buying school privileges wholesale for all of the children 
and paying for them with taxes. If each family educated its own 
children separately from the others, the parents would have to give 
as much time and effort to educating two or three children in a family 
as one teacher gives to educating 20 or 30 children in a school. The 
cost of educating the children in family groups would be many times 
greater than the cost of educating them in the public-school groups. 
It is the wish of most parents that their children shall get a better 
education than they had for themselves. Most parents would find it 
impossible to instruct their children through modern high-school 
courses on the individual plan. Well-trained teachers paid by taxes 
can usually do this better than the parents, and do it far more 
economically as well. 

We have now studied four of the choice blessings of life in America 
which are bought and paid for with taxes. These are (1) protec¬ 
tion for my life, (2) protection for my property, (3) roads for my 
use, and (4) schools for the young. 

It is the business of the school in teaching citizenship to help each 
little citizen to visualize clearly the many choice things which the 
citizen really buys when he pays his taxes, to realize that these are 
actually delivered to him by organized society, and to appreciate the 
fact that through buying them wholesale he buys them at the greatest 
possible advantage—at a real bargain. 


TAXPAYING AS A LESSON IN CITIZENSHIP. 


7 


It is also the province of the school in teaching citizenship to 
bring the little citizen to an appreciation of the fact that it is a 
manly act for the big citizen to carry willingly his share of the cost 
of these blessings purchased through taxation. That the citizen 
who fails to pay his share of the cost is a sneak who leaves his share 
of the task for some one else to do. The sneak is not tolerated 
among boys at their play. One day, as schoolboys, we were busily 
engaged in the enterprise of hauling stones up a hill to build a fort 
on top. The load was heavy, and each bent his full energy to the 
task, pushing or pulling as the opportunity offered. Suddenly we 
realized that the load had grown decidedly heavier on each one of 
us, and glancing up we saw that one of the boys was no longer 
pulling his share, but had climbed on the wagon and was stealing a 
ride at the expense of the rest of us. The decision of the boys was 
instantaneous and just—they ordered the offender to pull his share 
of the load or get out of the group. The school should develop a 
public opinion which will promptly order the tax evader to pull 
his share of the load or get out of the group. Children can be led 
to see the effect of tax evasion when some one “ steals a ride ” at the 
expense of the others, and demand fair play. 

An enduring civilization can be built on the sound and wholesome 
principle stated by the Great Teacher, “ Whatsoever ye would that 
men should do unto you do ye even so to them.” 

In like manner the sound and wholesome principle to guide the 
citizen in the payment of his taxes is that every citizen shall con¬ 
tribute to the support of his country in proportion to his ability 
to pay . 

An enduring society can be built up on this principle when its 
ideals begin to function in the lives of the boys and girls who have 
formed vital concepts of the duties of citizenship in the public 
schools. 

SUMMARY. 

We have seen that the people require the teaching of citizenship 
as one of the most important duties of the American public school. 

That one of the most important duties of the good citizen is to pay 
his taxes willingly. 

That the choicest things in civilization are paid for with taxes. 

That through cooperative buying on a large scale protection to 
life, protection to property, roads, schools, and other advantages of 
American civilization can be purchased at a much greater bargain 
than if purchased individually, and they are most economically paid 
for through taxation. 


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TAXPAYING AS A LESSON IN CITIZENSHIP. 


i 


That the individual who sneaks out of paying his fair share and 
rides at the expense of the others throws an unfair burden on all the 
rest. , 

In conclusion, let us note that the American public school is sup¬ 
ported by taxation. Therefore the school provides for its own pros¬ 
perity and perpetuates itself when it teaches the coming citizens to 
pay their taxes intelligently and willingly. 

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